Life of Raja-dharma-pravina T . R . A . Tambu Chetti, C.I.E." by T. R . Dhanasami Chetti. 

A rather novel departure in Tamil biographical writing has recently been inaugurated by the appearance of the " Life of Raja-dharma-pravina T . R . A . Tambu Chetti, C.I.E." by T. R . Dhanasami Chetti, formerly Assistant Registrar of the Mysore Chief Court. The book is elegantly printed by Messrs. Hoe & Co., Madras, and the Tamil in which it is written, is simple, straightforward and sober. The subject of the biography filled the high position of the Acting Dewan of Mysore, a few years before his lamented decease in June 1907, and was a Christian gentleman of Roman Catholic pursuasion, who rose, by dint of his talents and accomplishments, to the high place he came to occupy at last. The biographer is the younger brother of the late Mr. Tambu Chetti, and states in the fore-word that he writes the present work as a grateful tribute to the memory of the person to whom he was indebted for many good and gracious acts of heart-felt value, and that he regards the biography as a final act of public duty which he owed to his worthy and saintly brother. The book is conceived on the lines of modern European biographies, and contains a connected narrative of Mr. Chetti's life and doings, interspersed with a number of interesting letters written by or to him, extracts from his public utterances and private conversations, the whole method of piecing together the chronicler's account and the subject's words, strongly reminding us of such books as " T h e Life and Letters of T . H. Huxley " The Life and Letters of Lord Tennyson ", and the like. In a word, the book has a complete Boswellian ring about it, with every virtue that should accompany such an aim. As most of the letters reproduced in the book are necessarily translations from English originals, and as the bulk of the subjects dealt with, is of a character that is thoroughly Western in flavour and thought, it must have cost the translator a great deal of patience and zeal, to make the Indo-European culture and atmosphere by which Mr. Chetti's public and private life was surrounded, a picture of reality to the average Tamil reader. W e have, however, grave misgivings whether the biographer has scored a victory in this portion of his task. English- knowing students of Tamil will, for a certainty, have no difficulty in reading and following the biography with pleasure and profit to themselves, but to those for whom it is, apparently, mainly intended, it is seven to one uncertain that it is adapted in any real sense. The scene of Mr. Chetti's last moments pictured on pp. 130 et seq., is pathetically tender, and reveals in a telling manner the deep trait of godliness that must have always underlain a disposition, already humane if austere, compassionate if just.
Source : 
Siddhanta Deepika Volume 10 (see Page 471)